its use.

There has been considerable difference of opinion, however, as to the time and methods of its application for beets. I think much of this disagreement is due to the different requirements of the various soils. Probably barnyard manure is good for all kinds of soil on which sugar beets are grown. As to the time of its application I do not care to make a suggestion, except that the farmer should experiment with his soil, study the action of similar soils, and follow his best judgment. Any farmer can largely increase his supply of barnyard manure by a methodical effort. I wish to call attention to the helpfulness of a sugar factory in this particular. Through the pulp produced by it and beet leaves and beet tops left in the fields the sugar factory makes possible a large increase in the number of animals kept on the farm. These by-products afford abundant stock food and stimulate animal production.

The farmer takes a load of beets to the factory and takes home a load of pulp. He gathers his beet leaves or stores them or mixes them with pulp, in a silo made for that purpose. Both the pulp and the leaves are good for young animals, fattening animals, and dairy cows. The barnyard manure should be carefully preserved and taken back to the land, increasing the humus and supplying nitrogen and other plant foods. The sugar factory has extracted the sugar, which is not a part of the soil's fertility. Assuming that he returns all of the manure resulting from feeding, the pulp from his beets, and the beet leaves of the crop, he has returned to the soil again all the fertility appropriated by the beets, except that assimilated by the animals. The farmer has intensified the productiveness of his lands and increased the profits of cropping. Every city or town affords a supply of barnyard manure. The citizens are glad to get rid of it. They will give it away, and sometimes they will pay for its removal. When a farmer takes a ton of beets to the factory he receives only a half ton of pulp in return. He will be able only to bring home half as many tons of pulp as he delivers tons of beets. But he need not return empty-handed; he can return half the time loaded with barnyard manure and distribute it on his farm. In this way he can haul a load from as well as to the factory, thus largely reducing the net cost of delivering the beets.

I have talked with thoughtful, progressive, and successful farmers who claim that a special trip for the average distance the farmers haul beets to the factory, made for the sole purpose of procuring manure from the towns of the vicinity, is highly profitable. If this be true, then in case he can return to the farm with a good load of manure after unloading his beets, it virtually costs him nothing to deliver a load of beets to the factory.

EXPERIMENTS WITH COMMERCIAL FERTILIZERS.

In the older beet-growing countries of Europe, where plans are arranged ahead for the manipulation of farms for a series of years, fertilization is one of the things most carefully considered. We are very little accustomed in the greater part of this country to the use of commercial fertilizers. In fact, we are not as much inclined that way as we should be, or as we will in years to come. I wish to insist, however, that we should not fail to resort to those methods of improving our soil now in use by every good farmer in our country, and known to everyone, whether he uses such methods or not. This is applicable to every crop, but it is especially so to the beets. The Department of Agriculture has conducted experiments for several years past for the purpose of determining the value of various kinds of fertilizers on sugar beets. Last year, at the suggestion of the Secretary of Agriculture, a number of similar experiments were carried through on a somewhat larger scale than heretofore. In these experiments 10-acre fields of uniform soil were selected and divided into two equal parts. On one part 500 pounds of fertilizer per acre were used, while no fertil

izer of any kind was used on the other. A ton of the fertilizer prepared for these experiments consisted of

This mixture was used in Michigan, Utah, Colorado, and Washington States as representing to some extent the several sugar-beet sections. In several cases no reports of results were obtained, but the experiments reported upon showed a decided increase in tonnage, due undoubtedly to the action of the fertilizer. In addition to the increased tonnage, the beets on the fertilized soil contained more sugar and a higher coefficient of purity than the beets on the unfertilized soil. In one instance where a sandy loam was used the returns from the 5 acres that were fertilized amounted to $291.32, while the 5 acres that were not fertilized produced but $144.68 worth of beets, a clear gain of over $100 from the use of fertilizers on 5 acres of beets. it is confidently expected that this work will so encourage the growers of sugar beets that they will hereafter be enabled to obtain larger returns for the money and labor invested in sugar-beet production. In some sugar-beet sections the growers have already learned the value of good fertilizers and assert that they would not attempt to grow this crop without the application of plant food to the soil.

EXPERIMENTS WITH BARNYARD MANURE.

As throwing light upon the advisability of manuring a plat of ground used in growing sugar beets the same year they are planted, I offer the results of some very interesting experiments conducted by the State experiment station at Geneva, N. Y. These experiments were conducted for the following purposes: (1) Testing the results on the quality of beets grown on land to which stable manure has been applied in the spring prior to the crop; (2) testing the quality of the beets in comparison with beets grown on land receiving no manure; (3) testing beets grown on land receiving commercial fertilizer, compared with those grown on land receiving stable manure. On the plats receiving the commercial fertilizer, 1,000 pounds per acre was used; on plats receiving barnyard manure 40,000 to 80,000 pounds per acre was used. In either case beets gave better results with barnyard manure.

In growing beets it has been generally believed that it is a bad practice to apply fertilizers, especially barnyard manure, in the spring of the year of cropping. These experiments seem to show the reverse of this proposition.

These experiments, which were carried through four years, included the growing of beets from high-grade seed from various sources, at least six different varieties being used. The main question at issue in this work was the effect of commercial fertilizer and stable manure upon the manufacturing value of the beets, with especial reference to the possibility of depressing the quality of beets by growing them on land to which stable manure has been freshly applied. A determination of the percentages of sugar and of the coefficients of purity has been the means of judging of the quality of the beets grown. If beets may be standardized as to quality by the proportion of sugar in them, together with coefficient of purity, then the conclusions to be drawn from the data herewith presented are plainly indicated, as the table following will show.

General summary of results showing the influence of manure upon the quality of sugar beets

Attention is directed to the figures of the preceding tables, but more especially to the general summary in the table just given. The data here presented are strikingly opposed to what is regarded as the orthodox method of manuring sugar-beet land. It so happens that, with the exception of the crop of 1901, not only does the stable manure fail to depress the quality of the beets, but the crops grown where it was applied in the spring show a higher percentage of sugar than where commercial fertilizer was used or where no manure was applied. In 1901 the percentage of sugar was but little lower, but the coefficient of purity appeared to drop. But in this case the stable manure was used in an excessive quantity.

CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE BUREAU OF PLANT INDUSTRY.

LETTER OF SUBMITTAL.

U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE,

BUREAU OF PLANT INDUSTRY, Washington, D. C., February 14, 1905.

SIR: I submit herewith for publication as part of the report on Progress of the Beet-Sugar Industry in the United States for 1904 the following papers, prepared under my direction by experts of this Bureau who are conducting investigations with sugar beets: (1) Single-Germ Beet Seed, by C. O. Townsend; (2) Fertilizers and Sugar Beets, by C. O. Townsend; and (3) Commercial Sugar-Beet Seed, by J. E. W. Tracy. Respectfully, B. T. GALLOWAY, Chief.

Hon. JAMES WILSON,

Secretary of Agriculture.

SINGLE-GERM BEET SEED."

By C. O. TOWNSEND, Pathologist, Bureau of Plant Industry.

INTRODUCTION.

The great amount of hand labor involved in thinning sugar beets, together with the scarcity of laborers competent and willing to do such work, makes exceedingly desirable any change in the beet which will have a tendency to eliminate part or all of this tedious work. The principal reason why hand labor is necessary in thinning the beets is that each of the beet seeds or balls planted usually contains from 2 to 7 germs, each of which may germinate and produce a plant. The plants arising from the germs of a multiple-germ seed ball stand in a compact bunch. In thinning, all but one of these plants must be removed, an operation which can be done only by hand. If, however, each beet seed contained but a single germ and these seeds were planted at regular short distances, it is evident that all or a large part of the thinning might be done with a hoe or other suitable implement. The fact that a small percentage of the seeds does contain single germs has led to an effort to

a For a complete record of the work to date see Bul. No. 73, Bureau of Plant Indus try, U. S. Department of Agriculture, entitled: The Development of Single-germ Beet Seed. By C. O. Townsend and E. C. Rittue.

develop by selection a race or strain of beets having only single-germ seeds.

The attempt to develop a single-germ beet seed was taken up by the Department of Agriculture in the fall of 1902. The importance of developing a seed of this kind was set forth at that time in a paper by Mr. Truman G. Palmer,' secretary of the Beet-Sugar Manufacturers' Association; and the various objections to a beet seed of this kind were also discussed. The real value of a single-germ beet seed as a factor in sugar-beet production can be determined only by actual test when a sufficient quantity of the seed has been produced to make it possible to grow trial plots of beets produced from single-germ and multiplegerm seed under precisely the same conditions and in sufficient quantity to secure definite results on a commercial scale.

The first step of the Department of Agriculture toward the production of an increased percentage of single-germ beet seed consisted in

the selection of a large
number of single-germ
seeds from commercial
seed.
It is noticeable
that single-germ seeds
are present in practically
all commercial seed, but
the percentage-usually
about 1 per cent-is
much smaller than is
generally supposed.
About 4,000 single-germ
seeds were selected from
eight varieties of com-
mercial seed and planted
on the farm of the De-
partment of Agriculture

parts.

the production of the first crop of seed beets. From the beets produced from the seed about 1,000 seed beets were selected and siloed, and these in turn were planted last season for the production of the first crop of seed.

THE BEET FLOWER.

The beet flower consists of three sets of organs or parts arranged in three whorls, as shown in fig. 1. The outer whorl (A) consists of five green parts which are so arranged that they inclose and protect the other two sets of organs while the flower is in the bud stage. In

See Report on Progress of the Beet-Sugar Industry in the United States for 1902.